International Fellowship of Christian Assemblies - History

History

The International Fellowship of Christian Assemblies is part of the larger Pentecostal movement that began in the United States during the first part of the 20th century and is rooted in a movement among the ethnic Italians in Chicago, Illinois. Rev. Louis Francescon organized the first Italian-American Pentecostal church there in 1907. The Rev. Frank Emma (1873–1948) started the first church in New York City for Italian immigrants. The New York Times reported that when he died, his funeral lasted five days as seven thousand people visited from various parts of the world. Later, Rev. Joseph Demola (1912–1987) continued with an Italian and English ministry in Staten Island during the 1950s and 1960s. The first convention of the Italian Pentecostal Movement was called in Niagara Falls, New York in 1927, where the group adopted articles of faith, which helped build the movement into a cohesive whole. In 1948, the movement was incorporated in Pennsylvania as The Missionary Society of the Christian Church of North America. In 1963, the body was restructured as the General Council of the Christian Church of North America.